A chaplain was speaking and a colonel had spoken before him, but Singer heard only the gunfire and felt the weight of the body bags and saw the wounded lying beside a trail. They would have to pay. At the side of the formation, the clerk with the dancing fingers put a battered bugle to his lips. His fingers did a slow waltz across the valves and the mournful wail of “Taps” drifted across the firebase. Everyone stood still and silent. Singer walked back toward his bunker, more angry and resolute than before.
In the afternoon, the Shake and Bake came by the bunker and told Singer that Top wanted to see him at the CP. It had taken longer than Singer had expected, but the accounting he knew was coming had finally arrived. At least the Shake and Bake had told him he could leave his gear at the bunker, which meant he’d be coming back. Singer walked across the firebase to the CP with just his rifle. The sun was high overhead, in the early stages of descent, and a light breeze caused the flag above a central bunker to lift slightly. A couple of shirtless men were throwing a football back and forth near the artillery pits next to the big guns and took no notice of Singer. Their job was the guns. Countless men like Singer rotated on and off the firebase, eventually disappearing forever one way or another.
As Singer neared the CP, he heard loud voices. Before he could enter the sandbagged tent, a gangly lieutenant with a ruck over one shoulder and an M16 in his right hand ducked under the flap, took three steps, then stopped and turned back. Top stood in the doorway.
“This is all your doing,” the lieutenant said.
“Sir. You’re a lieutenant and I’m just a first sergeant. How could I possibly have you sent to the Cav?”
“I know you’re behind these orders. I just gave the man some work details. He still went home okay.”
“Your orders to report to another unit came from Brigade headquarters. You can’t think that a lowly first sergeant could influence such things?”
Singer, an uncomfortable observer to the exchange, couldn’t be sure that Top had winked at him.
“You screwed me over,” the lieutenant said and walked away.
“You screwed yourself over. You won’t be an XO there. Maybe you’ll learn something and do better with the Cav. Sir.”
Top watched the lieutenant walk toward the helipad. “New lieutenants,” he said, shaking his head. “Singer, you feeling better?”
“I’m fine, Top.”
“Good,” Top said. “Have you written home lately?”
Singer paused to think.
“When’d you last write your mother?”
“Not sure, Top. A few weeks ago, I guess. Before the ambush.”
“Write her today. That’s an order,” Top said.
“Yes, First Sergeant.”
“The company got a Red Cross inquiry while we were in the A Shau. There was a mistake and a letter went to your family saying you were wounded May fifth. With no one able to locate you in the evac system and then the company in the A Shau, well . . . the army sent a correction, but that won’t clear up your family’s worries. Your mother needs to hear from you. Write her today, okay?”
“Sure, Top. Is that all?”
“No,” Top said. “A couple of officers are here investigating Lieutenant Creely’s death. I told them you were the one they should talk to. They’re waiting for you in the mess tent.”
“What should I tell them?”
“Just tell them the truth. No need to dress it up or leave anything out. Let them bury what they don’t like.”
“Okay, Top.” Singer turned to leave.
“One more thing, Singer.”
“Yeah, Top?”
“I put you in for a Bronze Star.”
“Oh.”
“You did good in a tough situation.”
“It was screwed up, wasn’t it? You hear anything about Trip?”
“He was talking shit when they put him on the dustoff. He’ll be okay. There’ll be an award ceremony in a couple of days.”
“Thanks, Top.”
“Don’t keep the officers waiting.” Top ducked back into the tent.
At the mess tent, Singer found the officers, a captain and a first lieutenant, waiting with notepads and coffee. Singer came to attention and saluted a few steps in front of the table where the officers sat, then waited to be released. The captain told him to sit then asked questions while the lieutenant made notes in black ink on a yellow legal pad. They were trim, fit men with light skin and clean, manicured hands. Their uniforms were starched and pressed, and their manner was formal and precise. The captain had large sweat circles under each arm. Lawyers with the JAG office, or maybe just the general’s staff. Other lieutenants had died and no one had asked about them, but Lieutenant Creely would have been the general’s sonin-law, which made all the difference.
Singer declined coffee and told them the story just as he recalled it. He told them of the initial contact and then Lieutenant Creely’s insistence that they go back in the same way to find bodies. He left nothing out except the RTO’s threats and the nature of Doc’s death, which didn’t really bear on Lieutenant Creely’s demise. Everyone buried things. When he told them of how Lieutenant Creely came forward screaming profanities, the lieutenant stopped writing and looked up from his pad and the captain held Singer’s eyes, as if judging his truthfulness. The captain asked questions about why Lieutenant Creely had come forward, why he had taken the point, how far Lieutenant Creely had walked, the proximity of the enemy when they fired, whether Lieutenant Creely had died right away, and the efforts to reach him. Singer repeated what he’d seen, adding details to clarify what he’d already reported to the officers. The last question the captain asked was for Singer to speculate on why Lieutenant Creely had done what he did. Singer told them of the rumors about Lieutenant Creely after May fifth, how Top had run the company that day, and how he thought that had precipitated Lieutenant Creely’s craziness. The captain listened intently, then thanked Singer for his honesty and dismissed him. The whole time, the lieutenant never spoke. That was it.
Singer headed back to the bunker, figuring most of what he told the officers would be left out of their report and quickly forgotten. Lieutenant Creely’s record would be massaged and his service would look good, at least on paper. Few would know the truth. That was true about all of them. Lieutenant Creely would likely receive a posthumous award for valor, restoring his reputation in some quarters as he had hoped, though not exactly the way he’d likely planned. The general and his grieving daughter would have the belief that the lieutenant died a hero and had an award to prove it. True or not, none of it really mattered. So much of the war was a lie. What was one more lie to save a man’s reputation and comfort a fiancée and prospective father-in-law?
Back on the bunker top, Singer put his rifle down in the shade of the poncho liner he’d rigged up on a couple of poles with the other end weighted down with sandbags and prepared to sit down. He wanted to see the sun, but he didn’t want to sit in it. California, on the other hand, was lounging on the bunker top, shirtless, facing west, leaning back on his arms to catch the retreating afternoon sun.
“Was that about Sergeant Milner making problems?” California asked without turning.
“No, just a couple officers with questions about Lieutenant Creely,” Singer said to California’s back.
“You tell them that fucker nearly killed us?”
“He saved us. If he hadn’t—”
“He nearly got us killed, the crazy fucker. He never intended to save us.”
“He’s dead. What does it matter?”
“Good riddance, too. It would have been us lying there for days, getting blown to shit, not enough pieces to fill a body bag. Who the fuck would have cared?”
“How do you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Sit in the sun like that?”
“The sun is my god.”
After taking off his helmet and shirt, Singer crawled under the poncho liner with the sheets of paper and pen he’d gotten
from the captain at the mess tent. The captain had braced himself when Singer had asked permission to ask a question, as though he expected something about Lieutenant Creely or the filing of their report that would be difficult to answer. When Singer just asked for a sheet of paper, the captain visibly relaxed and offered him the entire tablet, which Singer declined, saying he just needed a sheet to write home and that a tablet was excessive weight and would be quickly ruined in his ruck. The captain gave Singer two sheets and insisted he also take his pen, a fancy, silver model, apologizing for not having an envelope. Singer tried to decline the captain’s personal pen, telling him he could get a pen at the CP, but the captain insisted and dismissed him.
Sweat dripped from his nose as he sat with his knees pulled up and the captain’s pen poised above the paper resting on his helmet. He wiped his hand on his pants leg, trying to dry it enough so he wouldn’t ruin the paper. He’d written a couple of lines of “how are you,” trying to sound comforting, but now he was stuck. What could he say? Who would understand, even if he told them? Certainly not his mother. What would she think if she knew what he’d done or how he felt? She’d likely be disgusted, as he was in some moments.
How could he hate and fear the fighting yet love something about it at the same time? He hated himself for loving it, but that didn’t change the thrill he found in the power of his rifle. At times he thought of nothing but revenge. He feared what he knew he was capable of doing. But none of this was anything he could write about or even speak of. He would wrestle with it alone, afraid to name it.
He stared out from under the poncho liner, past the wire to the landscape beyond. Still holding the pen, he laid his hand on his rifle. If his mother knew these things, how could even she love him?
He reread what he’d written for a countless time. Barely two lines. What little was there looked fluid, almost beautiful, even if meaningless. He thought of crumpling it up and abandoning the effort. A rifle was an easier tool.
If his father had experienced similar things in his war, he never spoke of them before his death. At least not sober. It was only when his father drank with his friends that sometimes he would talk of the war, but mostly about the years away from home or the long time spent on ships or islands waiting for the next assault or the end. His father hadn’t given him any clue what to expect, how to deal with the aftermath, or what to write home to his mother.
In the end, Singer settled for unimaginative lies that he was on a large base and duty was easy, but the movies at the base theater were old and he occasionally saw helicopters and sometimes lights in the distance, but that he never had to leave the safety of the post. If she heard different, it was just a paperwork screw-up, which was a common thing. That was the army. Don’t worry. Most days he was just too tired from working in the heat to write. Safe lies that his mother might believe. That she would want to believe. He got a battered envelope from California, which he must have carried in his ruck since he arrived in-country, and dropped the letter up at the CP. He gave the captain’s pen to the clerk who would make better use of it. The feel of a rifle gave a comfort that a pen could never offer.
Near dusk California took a walk and returned, grinning, with five warm beers hidden in his pockets.
“I tried to get some ice, but that was too well guarded. It would have been difficult to carry it, anyway,” California said.
“I didn’t hear any gunfire,” Singer said.
“No one died over it, but no one tried to stop me, either.”
Singer was glad of that. He wasn’t so sure about California, but thought him better a friend than an enemy, though he still didn’t trust him at his back. But beers were beers. The man could find things. Just to be safe, they waited until it was dark before they drank the beers, sitting together on the bunker top, waiting for another light show that never materialized.
The days on the firebase were long and boring, especially after events in the A Shau. Going from the adrenaline-filled days of firefights and close escapes to the hours of inactivity with nothing to do but stare at the wire was more difficult and quickly becoming less appealing than it had been in the heat of battle. How many times could you clean your rifle and ammunition? Then there was the harassment about uniforms and haircuts from NCOs and officers who brought their stateside mentality with them and cut no slack to men just in from jungle fighting. It tested Singer’s self-control. The biggest challenge was dodging the daily details or the occasional small-unit patrol or nighttime ambush. Something Ghost had made an art form. So far Singer and California had avoided them all, just by luck or maybe some consideration extended by Top or the Shake and Bake. Either way, it didn’t matter. A few more days of this boredom and Singer would be volunteering for patrols. Too much time to think was not a good thing. Better to be moving. Better to have your rifle in your hand and be free to use it. Singer felt a person could only sit here so long before it would kill them as sure as an AK bullet, just slower.
No more mail came, no postscripts to the “Dear John” letter. It didn’t matter. He thought of her once, a kind of fleeting thought of what she, or they, might be doing. It was the first he had thought of her in days, since her letter, actually, which surprised him. That he didn’t care and gave no thought to writing her didn’t surprise him at all. He would miss her care packages, but the brownies were less appealing with Rhymes gone.
A few days after the memorial service, Singer stood at attention in a short line of men facing the company. To the side, the general, a small group of officers, and Top stood listening to a lieutenant read the events of each award. After each reading, the general stepped forward, Top and the officers trailing him, and pinned the medal on the recipient’s uniform. Ceremonies where awards for valor were presented in the days immediately following a major firefight were as much a post-battle ritual as the memorial services for those killed. After May fifth, Singer had stood in a company formation and listened to Bronze Star awards for Sergeant Edwards for leading fourth platoon’s assault against the ambush and for the men who had rooted out the NVA from the spider hole inside the company perimeter at the end of the day. Sergeant Royce, though absent, was awarded a Bronze Star for his efforts to save Sergeant Edwards and for “holding the crater against repeated and determined enemy attacks.” Fiction, Singer knew, but he said nothing. Top was recognized with a Silver Star for assuming command and leading the company counterattack and defense. Lieutenant Creely had watched with harshly squinted eyes that formed sharp lines on his face, his fists squeezed tightly at his sides. The ceremony had not been comforting with the events of the ambush so vivid in Singer’s mind and the losses still raw, burning in his chest and begging answers. Yet he’d envisioned himself standing in front at some future ceremony, being decorated for valor as a necessary validation. Of what, he couldn’t explain.
Today he stood awaiting his award, less certain of what any of it meant, or even of himself. Some days he was able to charge into gunfire without any thought of risk, other days nearly paralyzed by fear, or motivated to fight by things that had nothing to do with bravery.
Lieutenant Creely got his award, a Silver Star for “taking the point in the face of ongoing enemy contact to lead and inspire his men against a superior enemy force.” An award for craziness? What did it matter? Singer was alive and wouldn’t have to follow the guy again. Give the man anything. No matter the lie.
There was a posthumous Silver Star for Doc, for going “forward to treat Lieutenant Creely, his commanding officer, making repeated attempts to rescue him despite enemy efforts to repel him . . . killed in his third attempt, when the enemy directed overwhelming fire on him.” It was mostly true, but had been dressed up for more dramatic reading, as if a man going forward under fire to retrieve another wasn’t dramatic enough. A major on the general’s staff held the medal and citation that would be sent to Doc’s family.
The award for Singer was read and while he recognized the general theme, most of the details were fiction. The n
umber of enemy soldiers Singer supposedly killed was named, but how could anyone know? Even he had no idea. The clerk with the nervous fingers had a knack for elaborate storytelling, which must have pleased commanders. Trip would have sneered at the clerk’s ability to write such lively combat stories without ever having seen any combat, while drawing the same combat pay as the men he wrote about. Rhymes would have just smiled, leaving Singer to guess what he was thinking. All bullshit, Bear might have said.
What other fiction did the clerk write? It didn’t really matter. None of it changed what Singer did or didn’t do. He had his award, even if he wasn’t sure anymore what it proved or if it validated anything.
Top stood tall and straight, impeccable uniform, the hint of a smile, looking like the proud father basking in the accomplishments of his sons. If he recognized the fiction that dressed up the awards he gave no hint of it. His valorous awards for his service in Korea might have been the same. Well-written stories of bravery were perhaps a long tradition that made talented citation writers like the clerk valuable men. Courageous acts weren’t enough unless they read well.
After Singer’s citation was read, Top said something to the general, nodding toward Singer. May fifth or the shoot-up in the base camp? The general gave an affirming nod and something that might pass for a smile came to the general’s lips. The platoon’s Cherry Lieutenant who tried to stop Singer’s shooting in the base camp might have said it was craziness not so different from Lieutenant Creely’s. Singer knew it was fear. Raging, searing fear, out of control. Some fled, others raged with their weapons. If firing nonstop in your fear was courageous, let them decorate him for it.
The general pinned on the award and shook his hand and saluted, followed by a short line of officers who did the same. Top was the last and lingered, shaking Singer’s hand longer than necessary as though he was going to say something, but then stepped away after saluting smartly. Singer stood in the glare of the overhead sun, beads of sweat rolling down his cheeks, aware that his actions were nothing as dramatic as the citation’s words. Much of it he didn’t even remember. Had he really gone crazy, firing without stop again? He had refused to leave California and tried to crawl back to help Trip, but it wasn’t about bravery. It just wasn’t in him to leave someone, and in those moments fear seemed to fade. Brave? He wasn’t sure. It was nothing more than many others would have done. No more brave. No less afraid. And what would Lieutenant Creely’s RTO have said? Or Rhymes or Bear or Trip? Would they have thought him crazy? Or worse, a fraud, a product of a clerk’s lively imagination?
Perfume River Nights Page 29